With the advent of angioplasty, pressure measurements have been taken in vessels and particularly in coronary arteries for the treatment of certain ailments or conditions. Typically in the past, such pressure measurements have been made by measuring the pressure at a proximal extremity of a lumen provided in a catheter advanced into the coronary artery of interest. Such an approach has, however, been less efficacious as the diameters of the catheters became smaller with the need to advance the catheter into smaller vessels and to the distal side of atherosclerotic lesions. This made necessary the use of smaller lumens that gave less accurate pressure measurements and in the smallest catheters necessitated the elimination of such a pressure lumen entirely. Furthermore, the catheter is large enough to significantly interfere with the blood flow and damp the pressure resulting in an inaccurate pressure measurement. In an attempt to overcome these difficulties, ultra miniature pressure sensors have been proposed for use on the distal extremities of a guidewire. Using a guidewire with a smaller diameter is less disruptive to the blood flow and thus provides an accurate pressure reading.
However, the manufacturing process to consistently locate miniature sensors in guidewires can be challenging. For example, because of their size, current sensors on guidewires are mounted by hand in a housing cutout or mounted along a core wire. However, the optimal alignment of the sensor is dependent upon an assembler's ability to align the sensor within a given design. Because the sensors are often placed by hand, there is frequently some variability in sensor location from guidewire to guidewire. This variability may be compounded when sensors are located or placed by different workers. After being mounted, sensors are also susceptible to damage during further guidewire manufacturing steps.
Accordingly, there remains a need for improved devices, systems, and methods that have a capacity for increased consistency among workers even when the systems, devices, and methods are performed by hand. There is also a need to prevent damage to mounted sensors during additional guidewire manufacturing steps. The present disclosure addresses one or more of the problems in the prior art.